Posted
by
Soulskill
on Wednesday May 28, 2014 @12:06AM
from the swearing-circuits-rerouted-and-patience-circuits-bolstered dept.

sciencehabit writes: "Cultures around the world have long assumed that women are hardwired to be mothers. But a new study (abstract) suggests that caring for children awakens a parenting network in the brain—even turning on some of the same circuits in men as it does in women. The research implies that the neural underpinnings of the so-called maternal instinct aren't unique to women, or activated solely by hormones, but can be developed by anyone who chooses to be a parent."

Your children are a reflection of yourself. If they are difficult, it's because you are difficult. It absolutely amazes me that people never quite get this. If you want to have good children, be a better person. Seriously.

Your children are a reflection of yourself. If they are difficult, it's because you are difficult. It absolutely amazes me that people never quite get this. If you want to have good children, be a better person. Seriously.

This is probably mostly true if you're only speaking of behavior. Obviously my wife and I are the main influence since my kids have never been in day care, but they do soak up habits of other people they trust, especially older kids they look up to. My kids are all well-behaved, even on the three- to four-hour flights we take a few times a year, but my oldest (6) has picked up various bad or annoying habits in the past from his friends. One of his old playdate friends had a very annoying tantrum cry that

You act like there's only one possible consequence. Picking up my wife and kid after a long flight, I was surprised to hear a chorus of "Goodbye Alex!" and see three cute college girls waving at him.

To be fair though, at one point I would have thought just like you. It didn't change so much from having a kid, but even earlier I learned how worrying excessively about what other people do is pointless and it's a thing better let go of.

I took my 8 month old on a plane from Atlanta to Seattle and back. Kid was fine...never cried once or disturbed anybody. Just in case, though, my wife made little "I'm sorry" kits that included ear plugs and some candy to hand out to people around us if he was disruptive.

There was another lady on the plane who did have a kid who wouldn't stop screaming. The other people around us mainly felt bad for her and she was mortified, but there was just nothing she could do. Other people tried helping her and just nothing worked. Thems the breaks.

And now we're stuck with an asshole too many, that thinks that people aren't entitled to their own opinion, no matter how subversive it may be.

Everyone is entitled to their opinion. That doesn't mean you can't be judged by those opinions. Also, "The majority of parents who have children do so because" is not an opinion but a claim, an assertion about the factual state of affairs, for which the grandparent presented no evidence. And no, everyone is not entitled to their own facts.

That's just fine - you carry on believing that.
The rest of us will keep on breeding. As you are removing yourself from the gene pool, your beliefs will die out with you.

Strange, I see idiots breeding like rabbits and expecting government/god to take care of the children as if they had a mission to carry on the human race while intelligent people choose to not breed because they have something between their two ears. Having children because we need them to pay for your pension is nothing short of Ponzi scheme, having above 25% unemployment among the young as in Spain, Italy just screws up these "we need more children to work and pay for retirement pensions".

That's just fine - you carry on believing that.
The rest of us will keep on breeding. As you are removing yourself from the genepool, your beliefs will die out with you.

I'd be very, very, surprised to see a belief bred out of a population in a species with such (admittedly flawed at times) high levels of general-purpose cognition. Ideas move between hosts by quite different vectors than genes do, and (in most places, at many points in their history) the limiting factor for human population has not been fertility as much as it has been resources (not necessarily imminent Malthusian Starvationdrome!!!; but when a feudal society resorts to entail and primogeniture, or subdivi

"I'd be very, very, surprised to see a belief bred out of a population in a species with such (admittedly flawed at times) high levels of general-purpose cognition"

Why? It's a parents job to teach their children their beliefs and values. Even if they don't ACTIVELY try, kids will absorb much of it anyway. If you remove someone from the pool of "parents", those folks wouldn't be able to pass on those beliefs and values as readily.

Is it a "given"? No. But it certainly would lead to a decline and contribu

Just remember time discounting and the generally shoddy statistical intuitions of humans: While I don't doubt that your assessment is correct (I don't have the data, you do, and in any case I'm willing to agree for sake of argument), you have the sex first, sometimes even without consequence(I forget the exact stats; but some combination of failure to fertilize and early-stage spontaneous abortion keep even unprotected sex during fertile periods from leading to recognizable pregnancy 100% of the time, and the odds fall further in lower fertility periods) and then have to deal with kiddo later.

Given that humans tend to markedly discount future costs, and do basically every horrible thing imaginable to statistical judgements, it may well be simultaneously true that your assessment of overall cost over time is correct and laziness(in combination with poor assessment of risk-discounted future costs, and/or short term lapses in judgement caused by the relative attractiveness of futzing with a condom or hot animalistic fucking) leads people to keep having kids where a less-lazy approach would more rigorously apply preventative measures.

"In 1984 Vilfredo, Heloisa and their children left their home, their work and school and set off from FlorianÃpolis, the capital city of the State of Santa Catarina, in southern Brazil, to pursue their dream: circumnavigate the world on a sailboat."

My girlfriend and I have chosen never to have children because it would interfere with our ability to travel.

Traveling with kids isn't that hard. You can get a backpack with a kid seat that will work till they are about five. When they are eight, they can walk fast enough to keep up. So that is only a three year window when they are too heavy to carry and too slow to walk. My daughter was born in California. My son was born in Shanghai. They have both been to five continents, and both speak three languages (English, Mandarin, and Spanish). When they grow up, they will have an international perspective, and can be a bridge between cultures. Kids will only hold you back if you use them as an excuse not to go.

Traveling with kids isn't that hard. You can get a backpack with a kid seat that will work till they are about five. When they are eight, they can walk fast enough to keep up. So that is only a three year window when they are too heavy to carry and too slow to walk. My daughter was born in California. My son was born in Shanghai. They have both been to five continents, and both speak three languages (English, Mandarin, and Spanish). When they grow up, they will have an international perspective, and can be a bridge between cultures. Kids will only hold you back if you use them as an excuse not to go.

When you get to Israel contact me! My daughters have been on 9+ hour flights across oceans and have never been a problem on an airplane, car, boat, or train. I would love for them to meet your children and they have one language in common, though from experience children don't even need a single common language to play and make friends. Adults would do good to learn from them.

Traveling with kids isn't that hard. You can get a backpack with a kid seat that will work till they are about five. When they are eight, they can walk fast enough to keep up.

Walking around isn't the hard part. The hard part is going the places you'd want to go, which may consist of places that won't hold a kid's interest, which limits your enjoyment of it if you force them, or places they simply cannot go (rock climbing, hiking, etc.).

Is that a joke, kids can definitely do those things. They obviously can't go to as far of extremes as an adult can but you can definitely still enjoy those activities and many others with Kids. Hell half the fun as a parent for me has been teaching my kids about my own hobbies. The one big limiting factor is the cost of travel, a plane ticket for a child costs the same for an adult. Even then once they are old enough you can leave them with family or friends for extended visits while you go do whatever it i

Is that a joke, kids can definitely do those things. They obviously can't go to as far of extremes as an adult can

You just explained it yourself, and the younger they are, the more limited you are. The original poster said that kids would interfere with their ability to travel, which as a general proposition is true, irrespective of the fact that it may not be true in specific circumstances.

Kids are perfectly capable of traveling. I've flown three times with my son at ages 6 mos, 18 mos, and 4 yrs. He was fine. At 4, he was absolutely a joy to fly with.We were avid world travelers before, filling our passports and getting extension pages sewed in. We have two concerns now. One, our second son is still in diapers. I know they have diapers in other countries but I don't want to have to lug around all that changing gear my wife th

So when you are too old to travel, and on the downhill side of life, who are you going to share things with? I travel with my kids, and fly without issues. I trained them and entertain them so no one has to deal with them kicking the seat in front of them, constantly crying and throwing tantrums, and all the other stereotypical behavior of kids on flights. They quietly sit, eat snacks, read, play games on the tablets, or watch movies until landing. Kids doesn't mean no travel if you make it a priority. If a

I believe it because I had it, loved it, had it taken from me, long for it, hate the person I become without it, and wish I could wreck terrible vengeance on everyone who participates in the vile social system that thought it acceptable to take it from me.

Umm...those kinds of places are cheap to travel to. Even Western Europe and the expensive parts of Asia are easily doable with a little budgeting -- both for the travel, and for home life. If you want to do things, sacrifice. It always works.

You can certainly choose how you live your life, but I think your defensiveness of your choice and your distaste for others who've chosen differently speaks significantly more about you than them. People generally genuinely love their kids -- oh yes, they can be a h

Completely agree with you. A male choosing to be childless is too often equated with being irresponsible which based on current cost of living and depleting resources should i fact be considered as very responsible.

You should try it as a couple.

My wife and I have no interest in having children.

And an amazing amount of people act like if we'd only reconsider and see the One True Path of Parenting we'd do it.

I frequently have to restrain myself from throttling some idiot who thinks our choice to not have chil

I can't understand why anyone would want to pressure someone into having children. The last person on earth that should be a parent is someone who doesn't want to be. For some unfathomable reason, my M-I-L would say childless adults are "selfish" and just want to enjoy life for themselves. Oh no, how horrible. (My wife and I have one child. The article is right, it's changed me dramatically. You don't know that kind of love until you have a child.

I think part of the animosity comes out of frustration. As the article states, having kids generates emotional and biochemical reactions in parents - You wind up deeply loving these fun crazy little maniacs. Loving what they do and what they say. Loving watching them grow and develop personalities and understand the world.

People with kids want to convey those feelings to the childless, but it's impossible - There's no means to convey those emotions, no language to explain it, there's no means for th

If you don't care, you don't care. If you say you don't care, and animosity is bred, you are lying.

No, you're stupid.

I don't care that parenting is supposed to be awesome. I don't care to have children. I don't care if someone else has children.

But, if someone keeps acting like a self righteous asshole and telling me I'm wrong, and need to reconsider -- then I'm going to start to care. Animosity will be bred, and I might have to hurt them, or at least their feelings.

One assumption of this study is that because homosexual men have a specific reaction in their brains, that all men have it. It ignores the possibility that homosexual men's brains are different from the start. It doesn't consider/ignores the fact that homosexual men are wired differently from the start which means they may have the same ability as women from the start as well. The wiring that makes a man homosexual may be the same wiring that makes them more nurturing/worrying/ect like mothers.

There isn't enough evidence to draw the conclusions they are drawing. This is a simple matter of someone deciding correlation is causation. It may be true, it may not, but this study is pretty inconclusive and jumps to conclusions that it shouldn't

I see nothing referencing heterosexual single fathers and how they compare/contrast to all this, which would be much more telling as far as the conclusions they've drawn.

I thought they addressed that by saying something like it seems to be directly related to the amount of contact. Men in a heterosexual relationship, I assume, get less contact. I some cases, where the man is the primary care taker, it's pretty much the same as the homosexual couple.

Once you have kids, those comedians become funny again, because you've lived the things they talk about when they're talking about their kids. I never thought I would find the whole "I've got a crazy family!" bits funny, but I do now. I don't think you can relate until you've lived it.

That happened to Jim Breuer (not that he was necessarily funny before). I saw his new (2-3 years ago) comedy special and he had had kids. I had not had my kid yet. I didn't think his kid jokes were particularly funny at the ti

Our brains learn things by "rewiring" themselves. Why should we be surprised that spending a large amount of time causes a detectable difference in the action of the brain? Implying that men don't have the neural circuitry required for parenting is as retarded as implying that women don't have the neural circuitry required for mathematics.

Most people won't get it because we currently live in a time when it is heresy to say that men are better than women at anything, while it is also heresy to imply that women are not better than men at most things. We live in a misandrist society.

Really? Wow. There's been a giant storm of angry feminist rants on Facebook about this and every single one has been all about "a group of men (on the internet)" that are allegedly supporting the psycho killer because "they think it's OK to threaten, intimidate and kill women."

Implying that men don't have the neural circuitry required for parenting is as retarded as implying that women don't have the neural circuitry required for mathematics.

Heh that brings back memories, and not the good ones. I can't count the times the wife said something on the lines of: "I am the mother, so obviously I know best." The first half year after our baby girl was born, I had to really fight for my half of fatherhood.

Society nowadays expect you to do your half of the parenting, but when that time comes, your wife's instincts might take over and decide it would be much better if you just followed her orders.

Sadly, our society sees women as "natural parents" and men as "idiots who would feed the baby pizza and beer if given the chance." While out their kids, some dads are told how nice it is that they are "babysitting" them. It amazes some people that men can actually be good dads and are capable of actually helping in the house. (For example, I'm the chef of our family. I cook all of the dinners.) Part of the blame for this are the endless TV shows portraying the idiot bumbling dad who would go to ruin if it weren't for his loving, extremely-patient wife. (Have a TV show with an idiot bumbling wife and a patient dad and watch the complaints fly.)

Even worse is the view that all men are psycho kid-stalkers out to do harm to any child they can. If my wife and I saw a child crying on the sidewalk by himself or herself, I wouldn't walk up to them. I'd want to. I'd want to help, but I'd know better. I'd be seen as "creepy man preying on an innocent kid." My wife, on the other hand, would be able to do that because she's a woman. She'd be seen as "loving woman who wants to help a child."

Have a TV show with an idiot bumbling wife and a patient dad and watch the complaints fly

I don't know about that. I've seen "The Goldbergs" which is basically The Wonder Years except a sitcom and set in the 80s. The mother is bat shit insane and hyper over-protective; a caricature of the "Jewish mother." The father is fairly even keeled. I haven't heard shrill complaints about it.

Note that over-protection is exaggeration of a positive trait. Try exaggerating a negative attribute in that situation and watch the firestorm erupt. The sitcom "Bad Teacher" can get away with it because the female lead there isn't a mother (just a teacher), but just try doing it with an actual mother character. The intergenerational comedy "Mom" can get away with it because the "bad mother" in this case only has adult children. But exaggerating a real negative attribute that moms can have (addiction, irre

A few years ago, my ex had a miscarriage at three months. By that point I was already accepting that there was going to be a kid and planning accordingly (adding another room to the house, telling friends and co-workers, etc). We dated for five years and the stress that caused ended an already fragile relationship.

Since then, I've noticed a distinct change in my personality. It's subtle and hard to quantify in absolute terms, but it's definitely there and I'm not the only one who noticed. I'm a lot less interested in women than I was before. I'm a lot more interested in stability, especially financial, and I'm finding myself doting on my cat a lot more (she's the bestest). While I'm still in many ways "an overgrown college kid" I've noticed that I'm also assuming a lot more responsibilities with my life, especially cleaning, cooking, and being a lot more timely and responsible* in my behaviour.

It's hard to assign causation to something like this -- I'm nearly 30 now. Did I just get older and is that adequate enough to explain it? Was it because I was exposed to a lot of new things, such as The Atheist Experience which I started watching just after the breakup? Or maybe it was just a change in the social and political climate locally, here in Australia? Or possibly the change in friend circles (I moved across the country afterward) that did it? I lost a lot of weight, maybe that's it too? Or the change in career (IT to full time writer)?

It's hard to pin down, but something changed and although a lot of factors I can think of were environmental I'd find it quite plausible that there is a distinct bio-chemical trigger at play here too. Probably 75% environmental, 25% chemical?

Kidding aside, it does change you. I was fooled into being in the OR for the birth of my third offspring (a girl) and that changed me in ways I can't begin to describe: from a typical antisocial nerd, interested only in the latest techno-toy into a real person.

She'll be 21 next week and has been living with me for the last 12 years, after her mom and I divorced, and still think of her as my greatest achievement.

She is smart and iron-willed, so I have not really enjoyed being a single parent dealing with a difficult child, but at this time, I would not change one bit of the story.

YMMV and all that, but being a parent really makes a wonderful difference in your life.

Here, we use a large representative study in the Philippines (n = 624) to show that among single nonfathers at baseline (2005) (21.5 Â± 0.3 y), men with high waking T were more likely to become partnered fathers by the time of follow-up 4.5 y later (P < 0.05). Men who became partnered fathers then experienced large declines in waking (median: â'26%) and evening (median: â'34%) T, which were significantly greater than declines in single nonfathers (P < 0.001). Consistent with the hypothesis that child interaction suppresses T, fathers reporting 3 h or more of daily childcare had lower T at follow-up compared with fathers not involved in care (P < 0.05).

Agree. Commercials on TV call it "Low-T" and tell us to get it fixed by taking glorified steroids. No thanks- I like being able to concentrate without being interrupted with thoughts of sex every couple of seconds.

who persistently find in favour of the woman, ignoring the benefits that a father can bring to children: if mother does not want her ex-partner around the courts do little to help dad remain in the kids lives. She can break court orders with little penalty while dad is faced with huge legal bills and delays. The courts pretend to act in the best interests of the children - but really they are prejudiced in favour of mothers.

I actually think fathers are more important than mothers after about 5-6 years old. What makes a person good and functional in society is based in no small part to life lessons and examples of respect and self-discipline. People who go through life doing what feels good never seem to make it very far in life. This isn't something commonly taught or exemplified by women. But if you want to see what's wrong with society, try looking at it through the lens of needing more respect and self-discipline.

I had the luck of finding a husband who cared about me keeping my job. That meant sharing of the parental duties, except the obvious ones like breastfeeding. I noticed that not only his parental instinct was at least as developed as mine -- and getting better with each subsequent child, but also that he is more comfortable than me in this parenthood thing. The reasons being:

1 - he's more sure of himself than I am, because society taught him to.2 - he gets less hen-pecking and judging that I do. With our first-born, family would let me know that I "was doing wrong", and I'd believe it (see number one). But a caring father is like a super-hero here and does not get that much crap. And also can find better company (but that's just here where I live I guess as I heard horrible things from other dads). Also random people compliment him for being so involved with our kids.3 - he can lift 2 kids at the same time

Look, look, another woman here!:) Anyway, I was considering joking that as an expecting geek mom, that if men's brains get rewired, then perhaps there's a chance that I'll become more maternal. I worry about it.

The rest of your commentary makes sense to me. So far, I haven't been getting much advice that is critical of our plans, except from one person: my very traditional mother, who is probably secretly horrified that my husband is going to stay at home. She's already claimed that my longterm breastfe

So far, I haven't been getting much advice that is critical of our plans, except from one person: my very traditional mother, who is probably secretly horrified that my husband is going to stay at home.

I've got two kids and a third due in about 9 weeks. My best advice to parents-to-be is to ignore all the advice you'll get (small joke there.) Everyone you meet will think they know better than you what being a parent will be like, and that they know best how you should raise your child. Many of them will then offer that advice in strong terms, even when you clearly don't want/need it. Listen to them, nod politely, and go on doing it the way you think best.

... perhaps there's a chance that I'll become more maternal. I worry about it.

I've got two kids and a third due in about 9 weeks. My best advice to parents-to-be is to ignore all the advice you'll get (small joke there.) Everyone you meet will think they know better than you what being a parent will be like, and that they know best how you should raise your child. Many of them will then offer that advice in strong terms, even when you clearly don't want/need it. Listen to them, nod politely, and go on doing it the way you think best.

Father of three now all in "endgame" (college, high-school, and jr. high) here. This is the single best piece of advice that can be given IMHO. Some of us have a personality that is naturally inclined this way anyway. However, you may have a partner who is not. Some people live for praise and really take any criticism to heart. If so, its part of your job to help them deflect the bullshit. Believe me, it is incoming from every quarter.

2 - he gets less hen-pecking and judging that I do. With our first-born, family would let me know that I "was doing wrong", and I'd believe it (see number one). But a caring father is like a super-hero here and does not get that much crap.

This one is huge IMHO. Probably people who aren't looking at it from the outside like I do as a dad don't notice this so much, but society is just insanely judgmental toward mothers. There are shelves full of books with contradictory things in them that mothers are told they have to follow exactly, or risk their kids turning into mental defectives and/or serial killers. TV and radio is chock full of these snake-oil salesmen too. Anybody who listens to all that crap is guaranteed to be driven insane. Other p

This makes perfect sense - you no longer need the portions of your brain that store your hopes and dreams, so those portions can transition to finding ways to push your kids to be good at something so that you can live vicariously through them!

Cutting to the chase, having kids is fine as long as you're willing to make the sacrifices necessary to raise and support them. So is not having kids. So is waiting to have kids. So is adopting. So is marrying someone who has already had kids and becoming a (hopefully non-evil) stepparent.

What surprises me is the number of people here who feel that they have some right to criticize others' choices on this particular issue (although the choice of taking unruly kids onto planes and into theaters probably is OK to criticize). What surprises me more is the defensiveness that some people have around their choices, even to the point where folks are seeing posts on different choices as attacks on their choices. Just because someone makes a different choice than you, it doesn't invalidate your decision. Yes, I know that you who don't have kids like to gloat about your freedom. I'm glad you have it, but no one likes an smug asshole. I know you who have kids like to tout your responsibility and the joys you get from parenting and your oh-so-excellent child-rearing skills. I'm glad you have those, but, again, no one likes a smug asshole. So just lighten the fuck up, OK?

I had kids. I have friends who didn't. I respect their choices, they respect mine. There are advantages and disadvantages to each choice. That's the way life is. Now STFU and enjoy the life you've chosen and let others enjoy theirs.

Men have traditionally wanted to have their own children, and ensure that they were their own. There is some "selfish gene" biology going on here, as well as something more tangible. During the transition to hunting-gathering society to farming based, a man needed extra workers on the farm. To that end he needed to be sure that the children were his, and in order to do that he invented marriage and "chastity" and "virginity" for women to ensure that he got his bit out of the deal when he took possession of

Well to be sure accumulation of assets was a big deal, but there are people who posit other, not necessarily mutually exclusive, reasons that farming societies invented the concept of chastity outside of marriage. One compelling argument is that they used it as a form of birth control.

From what evidence we have we can see that starvation was relatively rare in hunter-gather societies, but it was really common in farming communities, especially when there were more mouths to feed than the land could suppo

The child production strategies with which I am most familiar leave no doubt as to the female DNA source. The male parent's genes have a more difficult time ensuring that child-rearing resources are spent on the right combined DNA complex. Should we be surprised at the existence of various strategies to decrease the probability of the male DNA source rearing the wrong DNA complex?

Why the hell would a man need a child to be "his" to do physical labour? What an absurd line of reasoning.

Many species display hostility toward offspring not their own (eg. lions). A "selfish gene" as you put it would most certainly have positive effects on selection. Protecting your own offspring over others would help them survive over others and lead to more gene replication.

"He" invented marriage for this did "he"? How rich. I could just as easily claim that "she" invented marriage to ensure "she" conti

Each to his own. It seems you "choose not to be" a father and thus the effects described don't apply or make sense to you. I have seen the changes described in this article myself and it only confirms what I have seen. I don't think the stay-at-home-dad thing is a bad thing or even being forced upon men in general - hell I hear more men arguing *for* the right to be a stay-at-home-dad than against it. I think you're seeing ideologically charged language where there is none; perhaps the mention of a same-sex

Perhaps, but these days, it's hard to separate the science from the politics. I'm leery of 'studies' like this as they're usually put out by some think tank or other that's looking to provide 'scientific' justification for a particular ideology.

I know three stay at home dads who thought it would be wonderful. They are now shells of their former selves as their wives treat them as thankless slaves. Also, thanks to lizard-brain dynamics, the women don't find their husbands attractive anymore. Nothing dries a vagina faster than a guy who's providing less than she is while doing 'womanly' things. It doesn't matter how logical the trade offs and value propositions are, that she's making the 200k while he's changing diapers and keeping house. This is a case of animal imperatives conflicting with social conditioning. One described it as being the one sitting in the 'guy chair' at a women's clothing outlet, holding her pocketbook, except it's 10x worse and it's 24/7. No sense of self respect for him, and she has no respect for him. Feminists say that male distaste of traditionally feminine tasks is proof of provincial attitudes, but really all they're doing is shaming men for being men. A lot of guys fall for this now as that's how the current crop of 30something fathers was brought up. I realize this is just anecdotal and that there are cases that work out, but it does mirror the trends, tropes, and stereotypes, seen in the media. This is clearly the direction society is headed in and it's really quite sad.

At the end of the day, some men are good fathers just as some women are good mothers. There is nothing special about that, even though societal prejudices seems to believe that is the case.

Now if you choose to live up to the male stereotype, that's up to you. If you choose not to have children, that's fine. Personally, I don't care if you live up to the stereotype and have children (as long as no harm is coming to your children).

I will admit to having a bias here. I am a male who works in childcare, and seem to enjoy it far more than many my colleagues (including the women). My experience suggests that neither men nor women have an advantage here in terms of ability to care for or our desire to care for children. There are differences in how we approach our responsibilities, but it is unclear whether it due to biological or social factors. Obviously those observations are n